In an emergency, information is as vital as water. The official advice is clear: “leave early.” But how do you act on that advice when the power is out, the mobile network is congested to the point of failure, and the emergency broadcaster’s tower has been consumed by the very fire you’re trying to flee?

This isn’t a hypothetical. As Fiannuala Morgan chillingly documented in her article, “No power, no phone, no radio: why comms dropped out during the Central Victorian fires{target="_blank”}", this is the reality for communities across Australia. The wholesale replacement of resilient copper landlines with power-dependent NBN connections, coupled with the shutdown of the 3G network, has created a communications infrastructure that is dangerously brittle in the face of climate-fuelled disasters.

In the last post, I explored the graveyard of ‘bricked’ devices—hardware rendered useless by corporate decisions. It’s a stark reminder that when you don’t control the software, you don’t truly own the hardware. The clear alternative is Open Source, but that path has its own critical vulnerability: sustainability.

But this is where the journey gets complicated. We flee to platforms like Home Assistant and embrace open-hardware projects, expecting a haven of stability and privacy. And while we find it, we often forget a crucial truth: “free and open source” does not mean free to create.